In the last two years, many cities in the seven sister states have become part of the vast Indian Railways with new line and conversion of meter gauge lines to broad gauge ones.

The Indian Railways laid around 4,800 km of broad gauge track in these two years, including commissioning of 900 km of broad gauge lines in the northeast alone.

Around 1,200 km of new lines were laid, 1,900 km of gauge conversion was done and 1,700 km of doubling (parallel tracks) were completed in these years. This push brought Agartala, the capital city of Tripura, and other cities in Meghalaya, Mizoram and Manipur on the railway map of the country.

The first broad gauge train to Agartala on its maiden journey. YouTube

All this while the Indian Railways maintained a track laying speed.

Now they plan to increase the rate of track laying speed by more than double to 19 km per day by 2018-19.

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A senior Railway official said that the speed of track laying will be raised to 13 km per day in 2017.

A station in Assam. Around 900 km of meter gauge lines have been converted to broad gauge in the northeast alone. IndianRailinfo

As of now, the Indian Railways is set to commission a further 2,800 km broad gauge track at the current rate.

It will be investing Rs.80,000 crore in improving the infrastructure while focusing on innovative construction methods to help save money. The official said that the Northern Railways saved Rs.700 crore through these innovations.